| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Gregory Gadow" |
| Date: |
19 Jul 2004 08:19:44 AM |
| Object: |
I, Robot - My review (no spoilers) |
I went to see it on Friday. I have to admit, it was no where near as bad
as it could have been.
The action was good, the special effects were fantastic and the writing
was surprisingly in tune with the Robot canon. Even the "robots gone
amok" theme that develops has its roots in Asimov's writings (I said no
spoilers, but I'll give a hint: "Robots and Earth.") The emphasis on
action was unAsimov, but there was a surprising amount of the
intellectual reflection which make his stories such good reads.
There was one issue, though, that annoyed me. Under the Three Laws, the
robot "Sonny", when confronted forcefully with an accusation of murder,
should have suffered brainlock and, in effect, died; the First Law ("A
robot may not harm a human being or, through inaction, allow a human
being to come to harm") is that strict. Even the fact that he was active
in the same room from which someone committed suicide and still did
nothing was a glaring flaw that even Susan Calvin, the robo-psychologist
(and in the books, the leading expert on the Three Laws) never picked up
on. It turns out there is a reason why he did not (and why the others in
the "Nestor" series did not brainlock at the end of the movie), but
*someone* should have noticed "Sonny"'s behavior as very odd.
There were a number of "inside jokes" that only fans of Isaac Asimov
would get, all of which allude to different short stories from the "I,
Robot" collection. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to spot
these :-)
All in all, it was a surprisingly good flick, despite the flaws. I
recommend it.
--
Gregory Gadow
techbear@serv.net
http://www.serv.net/~techbear
"Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the
bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is
tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists
for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to greater danger."
-- Herman Goering, http://www.snopes.com/quotes/goering.htm
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| User: "ArWeGod" |
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| Title: Re: I, Robot - My review (no spoilers) |
19 Jul 2004 09:03:15 PM |
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"Gregory Gadow" <techbear@serv.net> wrote in message
news:40FBCA70.402DEF74@serv.net...
I went to see it on Friday. I have to admit, it was no where near as bad
as it could have been.
There was one issue, though, that annoyed me.
I have only seen the commercial and a Jay Leno spot (talk show interview),
and I am annoyed. In the clip "the Fresh Prince" was pointing a gun at a
robot, in a room filled with identical robots, and threatening to shoot it.
One robot find this unacceptable and tries to stop Will. Eventually they are
fighting. At this point every robot in the room should have attacked the
rogue robot, as it was attempting to harm a human, if they were "normal"
robots. If they were all rogues, then why didn't they all just attack and
kill him?!
--
ArWeMissingSomething
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| User: "J Forbes" |
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| Title: Re: I, Robot - My review (no spoilers) |
19 Jul 2004 09:18:42 AM |
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Gregory Gadow wrote:
There were a number of "inside jokes" that only fans of Isaac Asimov
would get, all of which allude to different short stories from the "I,
Robot" collection. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to spot
these :-)
I tried to check out the book from the local library last
week, but it was already out.
All in all, it was a surprisingly good flick, despite the flaws. I
recommend it.
I took my oldest son to go see the movie last night, it was
sold out because we got there a bit late. So we went to the
megaplex and saw Moore's movie instead. I was pleasantly
surprised by Faharenheit 9/11.
We still have to go see the robot movie...but I'd still like
to read the book first.
--
Jim
Visit the Selectric Typewriter Museum at it's new home!
http://www.selectric.org
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